On Thursday American Airlines flight 5916 from Charlotte to Gainesville, operated by their wholly-owned regional carrier Piedmont, experienced a cabin pressurization issue about 200 miles out from Gainesville. Oxygen masks deployed in the cabin, and pilots initiated an emergency descent in order to get down to 10,000 feet.
The crew handled everything well, though the 48 passengers on board the Embraer ERJ-145 registration N922AE found the abrupt descent and oxygen mask deployment frightening.
We started to descend really fast, and once we were breathing, you started to smell this burning smell, so that’s when I got really nervous.. The initial moments were really scary, really freaky.
That’s not what’s striking about the incident, however.
The aircraft landed in Gainesville without further incident. What’s notable is what happened next. They operated the flight back to Charlotte. Instead of climbing to 30,000 feet as they’d done on the way to Gainesville, they stayed at 10,000 feet. And then they flew to Roanoke climbing to a maximum of 9,000 feet. After sitting on the ground in Roanoke for a little over two days, the plane operated a non-passenger flight from Roanoke and then back for about an hour.
According to American Airlines,
American Eagle flight 5916, operated by Piedmont Airlines, from Charlotte (CLT) to Gainesville, Florida (GNV) landed safely in GNV on Thursday.
While inflight, the crew received an indication of a possible pressurization issue and immediately and safely descended to a lower altitude. We apologize to our customers for any inconvenience and thank our team for their professionalism.
American Eagle ERJ-145
Operating an ERJ-145 without pressurization below 10,000 feet must be permissible under the circumstances, but it’s still surprising to see that happen.
Lower altitudes mean less radiation for passengers, not to mention better views of the ground.
That’s scary! Gary – have you ever heard of an airline continuing to operate (more cites) after that kind of thing happened?
It’s legal if it’s in the airline’s MEL and the FARs allow it. The fuel burn would be significantly higher, though. Makes me wonder why they did that.
The air at 9000 is safe. I imagine operating that flight was preferable to canceling and likely giving those passengers an overnight delay.
What surprises me is that the plane can be dispatched without replacing the oxygen . Yes , they filed to fly at low altitude but we all know that things can change enroute . What if there had been significant low level turbulence that wasn’t forecasted and the only way around it was to fly above it ? What if a low level weather event emerged ? Etc etc . As a customer I would want to know about the aircraft defect rather than finding out on the plane .
Hmm. Without knowing the cause of loss of pressure, it does not seem wise to continue until that question is answered. Other issues can arise at a lower altitude.
Back in the early 80s, I was on a, Piedmont (the long gone regional version) charter from Binghamton NY to Winston Salem NC on an Fokker turboprop. Somewhere along the way, the pilot came on and said that the windshield had cracked causing a loss of pressure and that he’d be making a rapid descent to a lower cruising altitude. What I remember most vividly is that, the host of the charter who was the Treasurer of a Fortune 500! company, had a panicked look on his face and was clutching his arm rest very tightly. Fortunately, the weather was good and the remainder of the flight at low altitude was slow but comfortable
We’re the masks hanging down for the next flight?
The burning smell being the chemically generated oxygen reaction which also gives out massive heat…
It is more common than you think for aircraft such as the ERJ/CRJ to operate without pressurization/oxygen or other items on MEL if allowed by the airline’s programs. It could legally be dispatched back to Charlotte clearly. And then flown to Roanoke I’m going to assume due to that being a Piedmont maintenance facility which is why it spent two days there.
Sometimes these aircraft will keep going for days, which is perfectly safe and legal. Chicago to Milwaukee, South Bend, Grand Rapids, etc., as an example.
Since 2006, I have tried to only fly on the majors and not the commuter airlines that share the same brand name as the majors. I last flew commuters in 2014 and that was an American Eagle flight. I don’t trust them as much.
It’s completely allowable and within policy. This is a non issue. Other than being a slottering of fuel
That’s it I’m taking Amtrak from now on where accidents can’t happen
Or driving which is the safest 🙂
There sure are a lot of armchair experts in the comments section here. More importantly shame on the author for even sensationalizing a non-news event. It implies that the airline operating these flights after the incident did so unsafe and illegally. The headline should read, “American Airlines regional carrier performs completely safe and legal flights after an non-incident that occurred days before.”
The airline’s minimum equipments list, i.e., MEL allows for a surprisingly high amount of inoperative instruments/equipment while still performing a safe and legal flight. At any given time most aircraft on any given airline have at least 1 or more inoperative equipment, some of which are quite possibly “more scary” than a suspect pressurization system, yet the general public is unaware and therefore it is not a newsworthy event.
Put out a story where an airline is cutting corners and performing unsafe flights, that would be newsworthy compared to this non-story.
When I was living in Key West in the early 1990’s I had a flight on a turbo prop, I think it was USAir? bound for Miami. We got onto the taxiway and the captain turned us around, said the fuel gauge was broken and he was bringing us back to the terminal so we could disembark – if we wanted – and take a flight the next day on. The captain explained that the aircraft had plenty of fuel, and he was confident in getting the plane to Miami, so if we wanted to hop back on, we could do so. First and last time I had the aircraft to myself, with the exception of the crew.
Roanoke is a Maintenance center for Piedmont. The aircraft was flown without passengers to CLT, then to the maintenance facility. NO PASSENGERS ON EITHER FLIGHT.
Had that happen before.
We once were awaiting a delay at YYZ due to a cabin pressure issue on a Q400 (which, unbeknownst to me until that time, apparently don’t even have oxygen masks). Anyway, we are told at some point that the issue hasn’t been fixed, but plane is airworthy and they’ll fly the flight at 9000 feet due to the issue. This is YYZ-EWR. Flight is 4+ hours late in the end, partially due to the extra time it takes to fly the entire route that low, and I imagine they needed quite a bit more extra fuel than normal. But ended up fine.
Based on what you consistently write, you wouldn’t have mentioned this incident if it had happened on Delta or United. That’s apparently (again, based on what you consistently write) because you want American to be liquidated. Sad.
As a former gate agent at a small outstation I’d much rather see the flight leave and fly at the lower altitude than deal with 50 p!$$ed off customers who would miss their flight or connection. I wouldn’t want to be on the flight because it’s hot and bumpy at 10,000 feet.
@Desert Ghost – No, you’ve identified the wrong person. It’s Tim Dunn that is desirous of an American Airlines liquidation.
It seems like they tested the plane on Sunday but since then it hasn’t gone above 18k:: https://flightaware.com/live/flight/N922AE/history/20230813/1510Z/KROA/KROA
I’d be surprised if there were many/any PAX on the GNV-CLT return. They were delayed over 5 hours, taking off at 10pm and landing in CLT at 11:17 PM. Not many connections to be made at that time. Interesting thing is that this low speed, low altitude flying only took about 15 minutes more flight time, granted the route is only 388 miles. Really illustrates the minimal time difference between turboprop/jet operations on shorter routes.
CLT to ROA is among the shortest hops in the system at 155 miles, so it makes sense if the weather is clear. On a normal flight they cruise for a couple minutes at 16,000 feet so not a huge difference here…
Very interesting occurrence at any rate. Thanks for the article!
Two things:
1. It’s allowable to fly that way?!? That’s ridiculous. Regardless of where they are cleared to fly, there was an obvious pressurization issue. The plane should have been grounded immediately. Unreal.
2. To the author, where is the rest of the article. It abruptly ends with
“Operating an ERJ-145 without pressurization below 10,000 feet must be permissible under the circumstances, but it’s still surprising to see that happen”
Did you reach out to the company for more info? What about the FAA. It’s disappointing that we have so many click bait stories these days where the article just isn’t written at the expected level. Too bad.
Not relevant to this story but I had a JetBlue flight years ago from Chicago to Boston that we flew at about 10k feet bc the turbulence and storms were so bad and there was no smooth air anywhere. Was rough the entire flight and we were in the clouds the whole time.
There are at least 3 different FAA altitudes where where oxygen has to be legally offered and/or used, and they are well over 10,0000′. Such as non issue here.
From my private pilot days it is legal to operate any aircraft below 10,000 feet without oxygen. That is the maximum altitude for a non- pressurized aircraft.
Read the FAR. 12,500 over 30 minutes crew use supplemental. 14k and 15k. 10k feet is perfectly fine. Please do not comment if you have no idea what your talking about. No passengers were on the plane after Gainesville. Regardless even if they were they would be fine. Read the FAA refs before you comment. Pilots are trained and completely prepared for these things. That’s why we go to school, pass written and practice application check-rides in all these things
Actually the altitude rules seem more generous than I remember them…
https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/91.211
FYI there is an airspeed limit of 250 knots (288mph) below 10,000 feet.
@TLU – Small correction. The F.A.R. for turbine operators in scheduled operations is F.A.R. 121.329: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14/chapter-I/subchapter-G/part-121/subpart-K/section-121.329
As an airline captains of 20+ years I think Gary the author left the important point of the story out. They operated the flights without passengers to get the airplane to a maintenance facility. Terrible writing
Years ago a UA 737 I was on lost proper control of pressurization (outflow nozzle froze, if I recall correctly). Masks didn’t drop as the problem wasn’t acute. We cruised at a greatly reduced altitude (maybe 12,000?) for a seemingly long time, and landed short of our final destination for repairs (or just a mechanic with a hair dryer?).
WX was pretty good. My only (very minor) concern was that below 19,000 but also outside of controlled approach patterns, we were flying with the VFR general aviation planes. The flight deck on that RJ at 8 or 9,000 would be wanting to keep eyes peeled 🙂
These aircraft routinely operates 200-300 mile flights so climbing to 10k would probably burn marginally more fuel than climbing to 15k. It’ll probably put weird publicity in the news cycle, though.
I was on this plane when it left ROA on the Sunday following maintenance. The plane we were originally scheduled to take to CLT was broken and we were able to swap to this plane as a replacement. There was nothing abnormal about our quick hop to Charlotte.
The FAA rules state that cabin altitude must not exceed 8,000 feet. After loss of cabin pressure, they should have landed immediately.
https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-14/chapter-I/subchapter-C/part-25/subpart-D/subject-group-ECFRc61d71ee0787390/section-25.841#
@James A – No sir. The reference you’ve cited basically details an equipage standard for maintaining cabin pressure altitudes (measured in mean sea level) of between 0′ (sea level) and 8000′ during flight. Also, there are certain mitigations outlined therein for failures and special considerations (i.e., operation for high altitude airports).
The oxygenated conditioned air recirculated in an aircraft cabin during flight must approximate what a human body would typically be exposed to in a terrestrial environment. Aeromedicine recognizes that oxygenated air sufficient enough to maintain life exists at altitudes above 8000ft, hence the FARs’ cited earlier in this thread.
Though targeted at a pilot audience, this FAA brochure might be helpful in understanding the dynamics of oxygen at altitude. It is pretty straightforward & doesn’t contain a lot of jargon: https://www.faa.gov/pilots/safety/pilotsafetybrochures/media/hypoxia.pdf